Originally aired on November 17, 1995 - In part 64 of our Civil War series, Virginia Tech history professor James Robertson profiles the eccentric Union General Daniel Lee Sickles, whom Robertson says wore notoriety “like a flowing cape.”
#64 – Daniel E. Sickles
In any list of Civil War eccentrics, the name of Daniel E. Sickles will be at or near the top. He wore notoriety like a flowing cape. Whether he was politicking, fighting, drinking, or wenching. Sickles always seemed to be running with the throttle wide open.
Born in New York City in 1819, he attended New York University and entered the field of law. He quickly became a Tammany Hall stalwart, which in turn brought him election in 1856 to the U. S. House of Representatives. Sickles’ one notable congressional accomplishment was to introduce a bill making George Washington’s birth date a national holiday.
Ambition drove Sickles, just as passion betrayed him. At his wedding to the daughter of an Italian opera conductor, Sickles was thirty-two and his bride sixteen. Sickles’ vitality made it impossible for him to confine himself to one woman. Yet when he heard that his neglected wife was having an affair with the son of the man who wrote The Star-Spangled Banner, Sickles killed Philip Key in cold blood on a Washington street.
Ohio attorney Edwin Stanton got Sickles acquitted of murder on the novel defense of “innocent by reason of temporary insanity”. Sickles then added insult to injury with a public statement forgiving his wife. Even though he would find another wife in time, Sickles never took marriage seriously (his own or anyone else’s).
Civil war came. Sickles insisted on being the center of turmoil. When the governor of New York authorized him to raise a 1,000-man regiment, Sickles responded by recruiting a 5,000-man brigade. That large a command brought a general’s stars. The army was slow in supplying much-needed tents, whereupon Sickles purchased a circus tent from P. T. Barnum and sent the government the bill. Small wonder that the soldiers loved “Good Old Dan”.
Commanding officers did not share that affection, for Sickles interpreted orders quite loosely. At Chancellorsville, he was told to move forward a short distance. Sickles advanced so far that when Stonewall Jackson’s men slammed into and shattered the Union flank, the pieces had nothing on which to fall back for support.
Two months later, Sickles did it again. In defiance of orders, he advanced his corps into an indefensible peach orchard at Gettysburg. A third of his men were killed or wounded in the fighting. Shrapnel splintered Sickles’ leg, necessitating amputation. A few days later, the Army Medical Museum in Washington received a box marked “With the compliments of Major General Daniel E. Sickles”. Inside was the amputated leg. It is still on display.
For a time, the report circulated that Sickles would assume army command. The pious General Oliver O. Howard wailed: “If God gives us Sickles to lead us, I shall cry with vexation…and plead to be delivered.”
In 1865, President Andrew Johnson appointed Sickles to command the military district of the Carolinas. Sickles’ public criticisms of Johnson’s reconstruction policies led the president to fire the general – who responded by working arduously for Johnson’s impeachment. Two years later, President Grant named him ambassador to Spain. Sickles responded by engaging in a brazen and bizarre affair with Isabella, the former queen of Spain. He returned home to New York and, in spite of his sordid past, won another election to the Congress.
“Good Old Dan” was not through. He served a long tenure as chairman of the New York State Monuments Commission. That came to an end when he was ninety-two. Strong accusations arose that Sickles had continually embezzles funds designated for battlefield memorials.
In 1914 he died alone, irresponsible, and cantankerous. Sickles had squandered a fortune estimated at $5 million on everything from business deals and gambling debts to fine clothes and beautiful women. To cap it all, he was buried in a hero’s grave at Arlington National Cemetery.
